WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION 51

would come in there probably around the 15th of September. These
people, for the most part, were cotton farmers in their own district
In Mexico, and their own crops having been harvested, they came
into the United States to pick up some money in the United States.
They live mostly on the farm, most of our farmers having some living
quarters on their farms. They would live in that house and pick the
cotton on the farms on which they were living and as soon as that
cotton was picked, they would go to the adjoining farm. Those
people, for the most part were skilled in the picking of cotton and our
prevailing rate for cotton picking is 1 cent a pound for the first picking.
 We have several periods in which we pick cotton owing to the
fact that it matures slowly. The later pickings, the rate is 1% to
1% cents, and it is not at all unusual for a cotton picker to be able to
earn from $4 to $5 a day under those conditions. Those people thus
coming in from Mexico, quite generally go back to their own country
after the picking season has ended.
There is also during the summer, a period during which the fields
must be cultivated and the cotton must be chopped. However, the
labor demands in that period we think we can supply from our own
population. Our principal preoccupation is with the lack of sufficient
local labor during the cotton-picking season. i
I may say we have made efforts to secure labor in this portion of
New Mexico for four or five months, through advertisements in
newspapers, and we have advertised in both English and Spanish
papers. We have sought to bring this labor shortage to the attention
of the populations along the Rio Grande through county agents,
county clerks and sheriffs, and the chambers of commerce, but so far
we have succeeded practically in attracting no one from those communities.
 The native New Mexican is so constituted that he hates
to leave home overnight and the result is we have received no appre-*iable
 number of people from those sections.
Mr. Box. The population in the counties up above your town is
heavy, is it not? }
Mr. FLeminG. There are only a few counties of any consequence.
The rest of the population is scattered in villages of only three or
four hundred people, with the exception of a few.
The Cuamrman. I want to interject that both yourself and the
other witnesses from Texas, each of whom has come unprepared, has
given just the information we want, rather than bringing set papers.
How about educating the children of these people?
Mr. FLEMiNG. Our native born? }
The Cuairman. Both. How do you do it? How do you take
care of the education of the native born and the children of those who
are more or less itinerant, from Mexico? oo
Mr. Fueming. The school systems in the two principal towns,
where the lands lie are fairly well developed. The native-born
Mexicans and the Americans are in the same schools. We do
segregate the negroes. . .
Mr. Simms. There are about 1,500 of them in New Mexico.
Mr. FLeming. For those who come in——
The Crairman. Is it necessary to segregate the black population
0 a State having no more than 400,000 people?
Mr. FLeming. That is purely local, sir. }
The CuarmMan. What do you pay primary teachers in your State?